


endless

by mindthewolves



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Prompt Fill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-12-24 00:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12000906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mindthewolves/pseuds/mindthewolves
Summary: Lena finds out that Kara has the opportunity to go back in time and resurrect Krypton.She'll let her go, if that's what Kara wants.





	endless

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr prompt fill:  
> 1\. [supercorp + hope] for anonymous  
> 2\. [supercorp + waltz] for @lost-your-memory/GaneWhoo  
> 

the flash travels back in time and kara is lost.

not like, literally. lena can hear her making pancakes in the kitchen. (she burns the first batch.) but when they sit down she doesn’t put her feet up on the rungs of lena’s chair like usual, just for the closeness. she doesn’t lament the fact that they’re low on chocolate chips. in fact she’s eerily quiet. 

lena’s concerned for her health.

the last straw is when kara takes an alarming fifteen minutes to devour her stack of pancakes. she cuts them into little squares, for god’s sake. with a fork and knife.

lena waits. she can be patient. she’s a luthor, after all. (she’s not good at waiting.)

the moment that last bite disappears into kara’s mouth, lena curls her fingers into the soft fabric of kara’s t-shirt and tugs her onto the balcony. it’s something she’d learned early on, reproducible, verifiable –

_sunlight : kara :: coffee : lena_

– and she wraps her arms around kara’s waist as the girl of steel unfurls like a cat in a sunbeam. it’s the beginning of summer; lena can almost feel the light settling just under kara’s skin. but even after half an hour she’s still…muted, there-but-not-there.

#

it’s late when lena closes her laptop and takes off her glasses. they’ve missed dinner. she looks over at kara on the other end of the couch, the book in her lap open to the same page it was an hour ago.

lena grabs her wallet off the table and pulls out a black AmEx. she walks back over to kara, sits down so their knees are touching.

she slots the card into the spine of kara’s book. ”penny for your thoughts.”

kara shakes her head, as if coming out of a trance. she smiles, but it’s an echo of a smile, distant and faraway. "did you need change?"

lena laughs. "I didn't have cash."

kara closes her book, credit card marking her place, and sighs.

“you know you can tell me anything."

she doesn’t look up, but she works her fingers into the gaps between lena’s and squeezes. “I do know,” she says, and her voice is sure again. “it's just– what if you could undo the past? if you could go back and close that deal last week, if I hadn’t spilled coffee on you before your meeting yesterday, if clark and lex had never met?

"where are you going with this, kara?" lena's voice is soft as she rubs small circles on kara's knee with her thumb.

kara finally looks up. ”would you do it?"

the silence condenses between them, heavy and solid and lena wants nothing more than to pull her close, to collapse the space between them. but kara’s waiting for an answer, and so she tries.

“honestly?” lena says, “I don’t know. I’d like to think– that I would, that I’d spare everyone who was hurt by what lex did. and maybe…maybe it would save him too, maybe I’d have my brother back. if that’s how it worked. if it was as easy as rolling the dice again, starting over with a clean slate.

“or maybe we’d make the same mistakes again, all of us. but in some way I’m the person I am because of what lex did, the good and the bad – that’s a part of me now. and hypothetically, if I turned back time and things went differently, this version of me would be gone, would never have existed. it’s strange to imagine.”

kara reaches up, tucks a strand of hair behind lena’s ear. “you would still be extraordinary,” she whispers. “in any version.”

and lena’s leaning in, fitting her lips to kara’s. “I’m happy with my life,” she says when she pulls back. with you, she doesn’t say, but they’re implied. the words ghost over kara’s mouth.

kara shifts them on the couch so she’s curled into lena’s side, and lena brings her hand up automatically, fingers carding through her hair (like a sunspill, she thinks. very kara.)

“why were you asking? it’s not– that’s not a kryptonian– is it?“

“no,” kara rushes out, “nope. it’s– I was on earth-1, and–“

“ _kara._ ” lena says it like _slow down_ , like _breathe_ , and kara does.

“barry can do it. he said he travelled to the day his mom was killed.” she’s hoarse now, her lashes wet. “he got to see her, and he could’ve stayed there, but instead he came back. and I’m trying to understand, but I–“

lena wraps her tighter. the significance is not lost on her.

“you could go home,” she whispers into kara’s hair, and kara nods.

this time it’s lena who’s lost.

because she loves kara, she’s in love with her, and it’s the most effortless thing lena’s ever done.

because there’s a ring, tucked away in a lead-lined safe in l-corp r&d, secure from prying kryptonian eyes. there’s no stone, just a solid band of white gold hammered into a möbius strip. _they use them in conveyor belts_ , she would have told kara. _so every surface gets the same amount of wear. I want to give you that: to halve the burden and share the happinesses._ now she’ll never get to ask; it’s too late for that, and she won’t make it harder for kara to choose. but she would have liked to know the answer. (she should have done it weeks ago.)

because kara’s told her stories, about her parents and krypton and how you can hear the stars sing if you listen closely enough. she listens. (fairy tales are universal.) but what she hears, every time, is the longing in kara’s voice. and lena knows, she knows the heart has no nerve endings but it still aches for this woman who carries a dead language on her tongue, who left behind a home she can never return to.

except.

that may not be entirely true, now.

“you deserve everything,” she murmurs next to kara’s ear, “and if that’s what you want, if that’s what you decide – I can’t stand in the way of that.” kara’s tears are seeping into her shirt, and lena keeps her voice very, very steady. “and who knows? maybe you’ll visit. maybe we’ll meet again.”

#

the sun sets the sun rises sets and rises rises rises.

kara says nothing. lena memorizes everything. a few months ago, a year ago, it would have been different; she would’ve built those careful walls around her heart and pulled away, instead of staying so kara can break it later. but she does stay.

she learns kara again and again: the lyrics she raps when she’s in the shower – they’re filthy – and the taste of salt on her skin and the way her cheeks hollow when she drinks too fast from a straw. she takes kara to an l-corp gala and asks james to take a picture for them, because what if this is the last one. (there are a thousand images of supergirl a google search away, but not so many of kara, and she just– she wants to remember this.)

the music is loud. she pulls kara onto the dance floor and kara laughs. “you know, I always thought these would be stuffy and formal? like, waltzes and tangos and an orchestra in one corner.”

“and you came anyway?” lena teases. “I’m flattered.”

“of course.”

and lena tries not to read into it too much, but it sounds an awful lot like a promise. it’s dark, kara’s fingers dragging over her ribs, breath warm against her neck, and lena can’t take her eyes off of her. 

“this _is_ a waltz,” she says, tapping out the triple time against the crest of kara’s shoulder blade. 

“I like it.”

“really? I didn’t think there were enough expletives in it for you.”

kara blushes. “I like it because it’s true,” and her palms blaze across lena’s skin. she closes the distance, chases lena’s mouth. “yeah,” she says when they separate, breathless, “definitely better than ice cream.”

kara takes lena home.

they’re lying in bed, covered in a fine sheen of sweat, limbs tangled, and lena is half asleep when kara’s lips brush her collarbone. “I’ve decided.”

lena comes awake immediately. she knew this was coming, but her pulse still races in her fingertips as the last grains of sand fall through the hourglass. she steels herself. (she chickens out.)

“tell me tomorrow? just one more night.”

“no,” kara says quietly, and lena’s going to be sick.

but kara sounds lighter than she has in weeks, her fingertips drawing aimless patterns over lena’s stomach. “all this time I’ve been looking at the sky for something that’s not there anymore, and tonight I realized. I _am_ home. I have been for a long time. earth is home. you and alex and eliza, you’re my home. and I’m sorry– I’m sorry I ever made you doubt that.”

lena slips her hand into kara’s, just to be close. just to know she’s solid and here and staying. she closes her eyes and breathes in kara, the snarls and snags in her heart evening themselves out. she thinks about the question she never got a chance to ask.

**Author's Note:**

> leave comments, I soak them up like rain & they're the only way I know if a fic's working or not. I live for ao3 pings =]
> 
> closed for prompts right now, but pls send coffee & asks & fic recs @ mindthewolves.tumblr.com
> 
> \---  
> playlist: ice cream - sarah mclachlan
> 
> _your love is better than ice cream_  
>  _better than anything else that I've tried_  
>  _and your love is better than ice cream_  
>  _everyone here knows how to fight_


End file.
